


Tattoo On My Soul

by MintSauce



Series: The Halfway House [30]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: M/M, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-17
Packaged: 2018-03-23 11:20:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3766237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MintSauce/pseuds/MintSauce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ian would always lay himself down under Mickey's hands, under his needle. He'll always trust him to do with Ian as he may. The results are usually beautiful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tattoo On My Soul

“You okay?” Mickey asks, smoothing a hand over Ian’s side gently.

Ian nods.

“You sure this is what you want?”

Ian nods again. “I said it was, didn’t I?”

“Just checking,” Mickey says. He rolls a little closer to Ian’s head on his little chair, presses a kiss to his hairline and then Ian’s lip where he’s got it caught between his own teeth. “I love you, you know.”

He sounds so fond that Ian has to smile. “I know,” he says. “No, stab me repeatedly you sadist, go on.”

Mickey laughs, but his hand is steady when it starts to work away over Ian’s skin. The buzzing of the tattooing gun has Ian tensing and the burn of the pain takes a second to hit.

“Just breathe,” Mickey tells him, not stopping.

His brow is furrowed slightly in concentration as he traces the lines of blue on Ian’s flesh, carving the image into Ian’s skin permanently. It’s amazing to see Mickey concentrate like this, it’s mesmerising.

Not that that stops it hurting even a little bit.

“Fuck,” Ian breathes out, head _thunking_ against the soft, cushioned table he’s lying on.

“Try and keep still,” Mickey warns.

And Ian does try, he does. He even thinks he succeeds sometimes. He watches Mickey’s face, memorises the lines of his face that he could never be able to forget. He likes the idea that he’s Mickey’s first in this.

He’s Mickey’s first in so many things of course, but he likes that he gets this too. Something Mickey can be proud of, that he can see every day and know is just another symbol of how far he’s brought himself in this life.

Ian’s never doubted Mickey for a second, but it still feels good to be proven right.

Mickey’s working in a small shop called _South Ink_. The owner had likes his attitude and his style, something so delicate and beautiful considering the crudeness inked on the hands producing it. You could tell he didn’t think too much about the fact that Mickey was gay, but it was probably more that he just didn’t care either way.

Stan wasn’t a dickhead, but he wasn’t about to start throwing them a parade or expecting an invite to any wedding. Which was fine. It was refreshing actually.

Everyone they met was either dead set against them as a couple or overly, cheerfully supportive. And while the latter was nice, it was good to see someone just treat them like they were normal. Like they were nothing particularly special.

Because they were, in their own way, but it had nothing to do with the fact they were gay.

He wonders how long it will take Mickey working here before he gets some more ink of his own. Discounts always draw Mickey in, no matter what it’s for. So Ian doesn’t think it will be long.

“Talk to me,” Mickey says softly, still completely focussed, but his eyes flicker up to Ian briefly. Ian spots the concern there and he can’t help but smile.

“I was just thinking about how long it’ll take you to get another tattoo working here,” he admits.

Mickey smirks. “You mean one not done by my idiot cousin while I was high in a stranger’s basement?”

Ian laughs, earning a sharp pinch from Mickey. The buzzing stops and he gets the message, _hold still_. “I guess so, yeah.”

“Next one won’t be so stupid, don’t worry,” Mickey says.

He frowns. “I don’t think you’re tattoos are stupid.”

“Ian, I have ‘Fuck-u-up tattooed across my knuckles, _for life_ ,” he says. He sounds like he thinks Ian is lying. Ian had never considered that he thought of them as a mistake, that he thought Ian wouldn’t like them. “Might get them removed.”

“ _Don’t_ ,” Ian says sharply, stomach rolling, appalled at the idea.

Mickey frowns at him. He looks confused. “Why not?”

“I like them,” Ian replies, tries to make himself sound as convincing as he possibly can. He’s not lying, but he knows that Mickey won’t believe him on this one. Once Mickey’s got something in his head, it’s really hard to shake it out.

“Why would you like them?” he asks, incredulous. “I told you, they’re dumb.”

Ian would shrug if he wasn’t on strict orders not to move. “They’re a part of you,” he tries to explain. “I’ve always liked them. Ever since I came back to the Halfway House and there they were. They suit you. You wouldn’t be you without them.”

He knows it’s weird to think, but those tattoos have been a part of Mickey so long that Ian actually categorises his fingers by the letters. There’s no _left ring finger_ in Ian’s mind. There’s only _the third ‘U’_.

He doesn’t want to picture Mickey without them, because that’s not Mickey.

He loves Mickey’s hands. Loves how rough they look, crude tattoos, calluses and scars and then how softly they touch him. He loves the antithesis of it. He remembers the surprise he used to feel when Mickey would brush his hair out of his eyes or touch his face gently when he thought Ian was asleep.

He doesn’t want to lose those memories with Mickey losing those tattoos.

He just doesn’t know how to explain that to him. He doesn’t really have the words to.

Mickey must see enough of it on Ian’s face though, because his face starts to turn red, that beautiful blush creeping up from under the collar of his t-shirt, the sleeves of which had been lost to the world long ago.

(He will never understand Mickey’s obsession with doing that.)

“Okay then,” Mickey says and he’s smiling.

“Okay then,” Ian parrots.

He listens to the gun buzz a little longer, winces before he can help it when it jars against bone and then, “So do you know what you want next?”

“I have an idea,” Mickey confesses, not looking at him.

“Well, what is it?”

“Like fuck I’m telling you, Gallagher,” Mickey laughs. “You’re just gonna have to wait until it’s on my skin.”

_(It turns up not even two weeks later. Just a small ½ symbol on the inside of his wrist. Mickey blushes when he shows it to Ian, his ears going bright red._

_“I just wanted something for where we started,” he explains, looking at the floor. “And to like show how far we’ve come. Symbolism or some shit.”_

_“I love it,” Ian says, mouth pressed against the inside of Mickey’s wrist and then on Mickey’s. He kisses the embarrassment right off of Mickey’s tongue. “I want one,” he says._

_And he gets one. The next day, Mickey’s needle buzzing against his skin. Mickey, marking him again and again with all of the symbols of their love. Their beginning, their middle and their never-end.)_

Ian huffs, careful not to move his ribs too much when he does.

“So why an eagle?” Mickey asks a little while later, his thumb traces the skin near Ian’s half-finished tattoo gently.

“Used to want to go into the army,” Ian says, not sure why he’s never told Mickey this before. “Used to have all these dreams about getting out that way, making something of myself with a gun in my hand and someone else’s orders in my head. Probably would have signed up too if you hadn’t been there that day I got out. Didn’t know many other options for me.”

Mickey frowns a little, glances up at him. “What made you change your mind?”

He probably already knows the answer. They both do.

“You,” Ian says. “You gave me a way out that wasn’t getting shot at. It was never about patriotism or anything like that. I just thought maybe the army could fly me away from all the shit going on here. Then you turned up and you taught me how to be my own wings. You taught me how to fly myself out there off my own bat, not anyone elses.”

It sounds stupid, but he’s always thought of it like they’re flying. Not quite like Mickey is some sort of guardian angel, but like he’s this amazing bird of prey. He’s this invincible, powerful thing that just swooped in and plucked Ian out of the masses. He made Ian different from that first day in the Halfway House.

From there Ian’s never looked back.

“So yeah, an eagle,” he says. “Just thought it was fitting, I dunno.” He takes a breath, doesn’t know quite why his eyes feel wet. He blames the pain and the needle. “Plus, they’re pretty badass.”

Mickey laughs, needle hovering just over Ian’s skin. Their eyes meet and Ian knows he’s feeling everything that Ian is, like always. “Yeah,” he says. “They are pretty badass.”

An hour later and Ian can’t look away from the eagle bursting out of his skin. It’s almost terrifying, how real it looks, how beautiful. Mickey is standing nervously behind him, picking at his cuticles.

“It’s amazing,” Ian mutters, tracing a finger over his skin, feeling the residual sting of pain there. “You’re amazing.”

Mickey snorts, looks away. “It’s nothing.”

“No it isn’t.” He really wants Mickey to believe that.

“Well, it’s no problem, Gallagher,” he says and returns the soft kiss Ian gives him. “Let me just snap a picture and then we can wrap you up and go home, alright?”

Ian beams, knows he’s probably going to be back in that chair at some point, laying himself bare under Mickey’s hands and his needle, to do with as he pleases. Always.

“Alright.”

**Author's Note:**

> None of that work for you? What about song lyrics?
> 
> You're just passing me by, like ships in the night <3 
> 
> Please don't, come find me! [themintsauce](http://themintsauce.tumblr.com) @BethCottrell


End file.
